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The Mujtahid

The Mujtahid Ijtihad has been defined as the expenditure of effort, seeking the (prevalent) opinion about a thing from the Shari'ah rules in a manner such that the Mujtahid feels unable to do any more i.e. it is the comprehension of the Shari'ah text from Kitab and Sunnah after exerting one’s outmost in arriving at this comprehension to gain cognisance of the Shari'ah rule. This means three issues need to be fulfilled in the inference (Istinbat) of the Shar’ai rule before it can be said he has made the inference with a legitimate Ijtihad i.e. three issues have to be met before the action can be called Ijtihad. Firstly, exerting effort in a manner until he feels unable to exert any more. Secondly, this exertion should be in search for a prevailing opinion about an issue from the Shari'ah rules. Thirdly, this opinion about an issue should be from the Shari'ah texts because these texts are the only source from which Shari’ah rules may be derived. The Hukm Shar'ai i

Can the Caliphate make a comeback?

The following is an interesting article, it highlights the growing realisation that many Muslims want the return of the Khilafah (Caliphate). The author makes some fundamental mistakes in his analysis: - The Khilafah will not be an authoritarian state as he claims. Rather it will be an ideological state where the system emanates from the belief of the people i.e. the Aqeeda (belief) of Islam. The Khilafah wil not be a police state like the repressive governments in the Muslim world. - The author assumes that Muslims from different ethnic backgrounds will not accept a Khalifah from other than their ethnic background. Although nationalism does exist to some extent in the Muslim world, however its influenced has weakened over the last decades - the reality today is that of there was a Khalifah in the Muslim world who sincere applied the Islamic system, removed the foreign occupation from our lands, launched war on the state of Israel, etc - the majority of Muslims in the world would suppo

International convention/norm and international law - Politcal Concepts Part 4

During competition over the post of the leading state in the past, there did not appear political actions linked to any international law; because there was no such law. Rather, since early history competition was through military actions represented by wars, invasion, and biting some frontier territories. This situation continued till mid 18th century, where the international law expanded, or rather existed as a law and legislation. Since that time, political actions started to assume an important part in international relations, and in the settlement of international problems. Thus, political actions started to replace military actions concerning settlement of problems, containing the domination of the leading state and competition over its position. Since that time, arbitration to international law regarding international relations increased; besides the use of political actions as a means for solving international problems, either alone or together with wars and invasions, increase